Financial abyss: Letters to the Editor for Monday, July 23, 2012

In 2008, voters approved $9.95 billion in bonds for the high-speed rail system. Now Gov. Jerry Brown and company will issue $2.6 billion in bonds for the first phase of this project. Apparently Sacramento is ignoring the state's budget deficit and the fact that the S&P credit rating for California is an A-minus. Where is all this money coming from to pay off these bonds and cumulative interest? Apparently Congress is a mirror image of California, aiming to live off of debt, issue more debt to pay off existing debt and hope our future generation can pay off all the debt. This project is costing $68 billion and will end up costing triple that. Does anybody know how much Japan and China spend to subsidize their bullet trains?

- Fred Reiner, Granada Hills

Money to burn

Re "Full speed ahead" (July 19):

So Gov. Jerry Brown and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa have money in their pockets to burn. Apparently there is no fiscal emergency for California, with billions to spend on a high-speed train to nowhere. I was worried that California might be on its way to bankruptcy, but fortunately the California State Legislature has a handle on things. All the work, time and energy put into placing initiatives on the November ballot to increase taxes will not be needed. Why increase taxes with California doing so well? After all, if we have billions to spend on boondoggles, we obviously don't need tax increases of any kind whatsoever. Please keep this in mind when going to the polls and voting in November. Thank you, Gov. Brown and Mayor Villaraigosa, for the great job you have been doing.

- Jon Vanderjagt, Westchester

Rev up the economy

Re "Full speed ahead" (July 19):

Politicians will say what people want to hear. Economists wanting to be quoted by the media will say what is asked, not necessarily what is accurate. I am not an authority on mass transit, but it seems to me someone must drive the bullet train. Somebody else will sell tickets, man the train, provide security at all stops, service the trains and tracks, build the whole thing, do environmental reports, assist the aged and disabled to board and unboard, and sell food, drinks and maybe even pillows. These are just a few of the jobs that those against the train seem to have forgotten. Maybe it is time for the pessimists to sit down, use their brains and realize this project will create jobs - lots of them.

- Tim Ashford, Lomita

Blame breakups

Re "Marriage is widening class divisions in the U.S." (July 15):

The article had some good things to say - there are certainly disparities and struggles for single-parent homes, and we'd all do well to be aware of those disparities and to help folks. But the headline implies an agenda or gross misperception by the writer. The cause for the widening division is divorce, not marriage. Marriage is the normal state, not divorce. A man and a woman come together, fall in love, have kids and hopefully work at staying in love. Without that ancient system, mankind fails. Two men can't create kids, nor two women, nor a single person. Birth comes from a marriage of a man and a woman. That statement is not an agenda, it is a fact. That fact ought to be less offensive than the silliness of the conclusion that marriage is causing division.

It's interesting to note that smoke was first noticed as a carcinogen in chimney sweeps in 1775. We have learned nothing from that, as backyard fire pits are readily available at Long Beach home improvement stores. It is not uncommon for our windows and doors to be open on a warm evening and have our neighbors light up the fire around 9:30 p.m. This results in a smoke-filled house with little recourse. Even if we shut the house up and turn on the air conditioning and air purifier, smoke still seeps in. The city has banned smoking in parks and beaches, but still permits the unhealthy practice of wood burning. The EPA estimates that a single fireplace operating for an hour and burning 10 pounds of wood will generate 4,300 times more carcinogens than 30 cigarettes. Let's start with a ban on the sale of outdoor fire pits and work from there to educate citizens on the health effects of wood smoke.

- Greg Korte, Long Beach

Serial panderer

Mitt Romney has gone from being a severe serial flip-flopper to becoming a serial panderer. There was no moment of integrity when he angered the members of the NAACP, and knew he would be booed, when he said he'd get rid of Obamacare. He did so simply to appeal to his radical conservative base. Such an offensive remark belies the fact the Affordable Care Act was based on Romneycare - a very successful health plan created by Romney and subscribed to by over 98 percent of the people in Massachusetts.

I'm glad Catherine Whelpley is taking parenting classes and doing community service work in the Jewish community for helping her daughter and the girl's friends commit anti-Semitic vandalism. But the remark made by the City Attorney's Office still burns me, as I am sure it would any hate crime victims. The fact that this woman drove her teen daughter and friends to the home of an ex-friend to vandalize is bad enough. I could go on about poor role model parents. But to add insult to injury is the remark made by the City Attorney's Office: The girls' actions do not constitute a hate crime, because the words and symbols were scrawled in a material that could easily be washed off. Let me get this straight - if you write symbols like a swastika in syrup, or smear human feces around, this is not a hate crime? Does blood fit into this category as well? Holocaust survivors have a pain so deep that it will never be washed off.

- Sheryl Taubman, West Hills

Reducing congestion?

How many more months will the intersection of southbound Pacific Coast Highway at Second Street be tied up in a traffic jam? The "workers" seem to have found a home, but the traffic still is jammed. The people who supervise the workers should be fired for letting this travesty continue.

- Matt Lerner, Long Beach

Snubbed by Emmy

Re "`Mad Men' in the hunt for an Emmy Awards record" (July 20):

Isn't it amazing that "NCIS" never gets any Emmy nods - even though the show has lasted 200-plus episodes, even with the 18-35-year-old demographic being what is prized. I guess great writing, acting and directing doesn't count for much, or for actors who do an outstanding job without finding the need to be constantly in the tabloids.